Welcome back to my blog series folks. Thanks for following along on this long journey of mine.

It’s hard to believe I started cutting up the parts for my top in January. It’s taken me almost a year. However there were some detours taken along with way on other project. I’m in the home stretch now!

I needed a hub for the screw. One of the luxuries of making your own screws is that you can make the hub out of any wood you want. I went with some QSWO I had left from my stretchers. I think it makes a softer contrast than maple against the walnut chop I’ll be using.

I’m pretty proud of the gain match on the glue up. It looks almost like one piece of wood.I went with a subtle concave along the length and sanded it up to 400 grit.

Drilled a hole in the hub, turned the screw to fit, and glued it in. I use axle keys as set up block a lot, you can get them cheap at Ace hardware.These are 3/8”, I used them to make sure I kept my garter groove at the right width.

I like how it came out.

My walnut vise chop netted out to 1.75” thick after surfacing both faces. I thought that looked thin so…

Resawed about another 1” off the rest of the board to laminate on to the board in the previous pic.

Glued that up.

Now we have the aesthetical beefiness! Or ”gravity” if you prefer ScottyB. ;-p

Then after some cleanup we have this. I also trimmed the board to have the grain pattern of the wood centered. I drilled the hole for the screw in a knot so hopefully it will look like the grain flows around the hub

Then drilled a hole for the screw, inserted the screw and screwed it into the leg, marked out the location for the lower screw, then drilled that hole.

And when we put both together?! Voila!A functioning leg vise! I’m stoked!

How does it hold you might ask? Like a Boss!

I will be gluing on some leather, for now I tested it with non-slip drawer liner. Here I’m testing out clampling a 3/4” board with a 1.5” “nut” in the parallel guide. I’m still working out the details of that part.

However with very little cranking the hold is amazingly strong. I can jump on this board and it doesn’t budge!

Next up: Shaping the chop, Jatoba garter (thanks again BrandonW), and the nut for the parallel guide.

25 comments so far

Maur, the whole leg vise holding power thing is crazy strong, as you’re finding out. What a vise you’ve made! Simply outstanding, well done! Bench is looking awesome, and reeks of aesthetic beefiness. Some incredible projects are going to be all the more possible with that tool at the ready.

-- Don't anthropomorphize your handplanes. They hate it when you do that. -- OldTools Archive --

The lower screw wont turn, it will have a nut on it that you flick with your foot to adjust the chop so its parallel to the leg.

So instead of having to move a pin as with typical leg vises, you spin a nut with your foot. The other advantage to it is that its infinitely adjustable.

The problem is that because my screw is 2tpi, and I want a nut that has at least 3 threads in it for strength, that means I need a nut that is 1.5” thick. This is an issue when clamping thinner boards.

The Shaker bench in Landis’ book has a 3/4” nut (4tpi screw), a difference of 3/4 is not an issue and that slight toe in actually works fine.

I’m thinking I will add a 1” “clamping pad to the top instead of trying to cut a recess or something to make room for the nut. I may double stick tape in on and try it out for a while before committing.

Fantastic Mauricio! Great work on this entire project and that leather is gonna make it even better. I use a strip of that on my shave horse so that’s a really good idea and way to go for extra grip. Awesome journey, enjoy the bench, enjoy your holiday and all the best to you and yours! Have fun!